I am back at one of my favorite retreats. Well, I guess at this point, it is my Favorite, back East anyway. Forget the “one of” part. Kripalu. It is a yoga retreat in the Berkshires, a short drive from Lenox, Mass. It is a former monastery that has been turned into a school for Yogis and Aruyrvedic practitioners. It is also a place for visitors looking for wellness programs, or just a little R&R. You can practice yoga here three times a day, and do this wonderful moving form they call Yoga Dance. The yoga dance is very tribal, very primal, sweat-inducing, and LOTS of fun.

I arrived after a four-hour bus drive, sat next to a cool woman who commuted back and forth between her apartment outside of Boston and the Vermont woods where she lived with the boyfriend she met on You-Tube. When you leave the highly caffeinated world of Manhattan and land anywhere bucolic, it takes awhile to adapt to the deafening din of silence. Crickets in NYC mean no one has come to your nightclub. The smells, the views, the sounds of silence can be intimidating. I walked around, made myself at home in my spartan room (happy to see that the unknown roommate with whom I was to share the room had not arrived yet). A gentle yoga class, a delicious vegetarian dinner, some quiet time in the sun room until three 20-somethings came in to gab. Even then, I wasn’t in the mindset to be the librarian and “shhhhhush” them. I just went to my little room and fell asleep.(more…)

Enough with the wah-wah “I’m not in Kansas anymore” pity party about your Italian vacation and there being NOTHING TO EAT in America. C’mon!!!

This is how to do it: get off your vacation exhausted duff (okay, do some yoga first). Let the airplane headache pass and move on. Or, just plain move. I walked to my Weight Watchers meeting and saw that, yes, Virginia, there ARE consequences to your cornetto eating – but basta! Enough. Move on.

NYC Italian Coffee Bar

I walked to my favorite coffee bar in NYC — Tarallucci & Vino — a completely Italian place, I presume owned by Italians, but if not – certainly the people who work there are speaking the mother tongue. And, their customers are. So, too, the bambini. I ordered un espresso DOPPIO – figured that being in NYC – I couldn’t just order caffé like in Rome and expect to get espresso. Squisito!

Greenmarket Goodies

A short stroll away: our version of the Campo dei Fiori – without the statue of the executed guy. The Greenmarket at Union Square. I filled my market bag to overflowing: beets with succulent greens still attached. Radishes, broccoli, cauliflower. I love fall greenmarkets with its squashes, pumpkins and potatoes.

Here it comes again: the E word. Exercise. The Marist Poll recently released its survey on New Years Resolutions and #3 resolution — behind lose weight and quit smoking — was I want to improve my body. I want to work out. But, shit, who wants to work out? Non-steroidally speaking, that is. It can be such a roadblock in the weight-loss formula of eat less, move more. But, we gotta do it.

A great way to begin any day — the calm and meditative strengthening of yoga. I try to get at least two sessions in a week. I think of it as covert exercise. You are so focussed on the moves and the breathing and the “moment”, it is easy to forget that you are doing wonderful things for your body.

Afterwards, I have what has become my regular breakfast — yogurt with a sprinkle of nuts.